Stealth Diplomacy

While Iraq Burns, China Stokes Fires Of Friendship

June 24, 2007|By CHUCK LEDDY; Special to The Courant Chuck Leddy is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and writes frequently about American history.

CHARM OFFENSIVE: HOW CHINA'S SOFT POWER IS TRANSFORMING THE WORLD

by Joshua Kurlantzick

(Yale University Press, 320 pp., $26)

With the 2008 Summer Olympics scheduled to open in Beijing next August, China will be at the center of the world stage. AsJoshua Kurlantzick shows in his thoroughly researched and well-crafted account of China's recent emergence as a global power, that country has been on the offensive worldwide, using ``soft power'' to win multinational friends while the United States has increasingly turned to unilateralism and military power, earning a reputation as a bully.

Kurlantzick, a writer for The New Republic who grew up in Hartford and whose father, Lewis, teaches at the University of Connecticut School of Law, is quite knowledgeable about China, having reported on it for The Economist and the Washington Post. His style is straightforward and accessible, filled with telling anecdotes and powerful examples that support his narrative.

Kurlantzick opens the book in Australia, describing separate October 2003 visits to that U.S. ally by President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao. When Bush spoke before the Australian Parliament, several senators openly heckled him for his Iraq policies. After Bush left, protesters outside serenaded him with boos. When President Hu visited a few days later, however, he was hailed as a heroic leader of a nation on the rise. China's human-rights abuses, its woeful environmental record and its persecution of political and religious dissidents were barely mentioned.

The soft power Kurlantzick describes is non-military influence around the globe. It refers to China's use of trade, culture, multinational treaties and (most important) its own model of economic success. China's soft power has been especially strong in the developing world, where nations increasingly alienated by American unilateralism have admired the ``Chinese model'' of economic growth paired with authoritarian government. As Kurlantzick shows, China is reaching out not just to its regional Asian neighbors but to Latin America, the Middle East and elsewhere.

China has skillfully taken advantage of growing anti-Americanism around the world, cultivating alliances with oil-rich developing nations such as Venezuela (whose leader Hugo Chavez recently described President Bush as ``the devil''), Iran (long a U.S. enemy), Nigeria and East Timor. As China's economy continues to skyrocket, access to energy is becoming its central priority. Yet China, unlike the United States, has chosen a soft power strategy for gaining access to oil-rich nations.

Kurlantzick shows that developing nations are using China ``as a hedge against American power.'' China has yet to push these nations, especially energy-rich ones, to choose between supplying it or the United States, but Kurlantzick believes that is something we may need to worry about in the future.

Yet while China presents a friendly face to the developing world and promotes multinational peace, friendship and prosperity, Beijing has a darker side. Kurlantzick describes China's horrific record on environmental protection, showing how its rapid economic growth has led to devastation of rivers and forests. He also exposes China's callous attitudes toward labor; workers for Chinese companies who demand higher pay or more workplace safety are simply not tolerated. And as the Chinese Model of economic growth paired with authoritarian government gets exported, these darker elements travel with it. Additionally, the inflow of cheap Chinese products into developing nations may create tensions within their labor markets, creating unemployment. In short, says Kurlantzick, China could soon face a backlash.

China's ``charm offensive'' has been enhanced by Washington's bungling in foreign affairs, he writes. He makes several recommendations for how the United States can respond, including re-committing itself to multi-nationalism. Our global reputation will improve, he says, ``if Washington reconsiders its opposition to multilateral institutions, an opposition that has fostered perceptions of America as bully.''

While the United States focuses on Iraq, with questionable success, China continues to work behind the scenes, appealing to a growing number of nations fearful of American power. As Beijing prepares its friendliest face for the world at the upcoming Summer Olympics, the United States and China will continue their global competition to ``win friends and influence people.''